Tag: news

Aretha Franklin performed “Until You Come Back To Me” during her concert held at DTE Energy Music Theater in Clarkston, Mich., on July 12, 2014.(Photo: Jose Juarez / Special to The Detroit News)

Public viewing and private services for Aretha Franklin have been announced.

The Queen of Soul will lie in state 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Aug. 28 and Aug. 29 at Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, said publicist Gwendolyn Quinn. The museum is located at 315 E. Warren in Detroit.

A musical celebration is being planned for Aug. 30 (location has not been determined), and her funeral will be 10 a.m. Aug. 31 at Greater Grace Temple, 23500 West 7 Mile in Detroit, and will be limited to family and friends.

Franklin will be entombed at Woodlawn Cemetery in Detroit, along with her father, the Rev. C.L. Franklin; brother Cecil Franklin; sisters Carolyn Franklin and Erma Franklin; and nephew, Thomas Garrett.

Conservative women challenge Ocasio-Cortez to a debate

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Democratic socialist star running for New York’s 14th congressional district, is facing criticism after her campaign banned journalists from covering a town hall meeting with voters this week.

The Queens Chronicle, a local news outlet, reported that the campaign for the 28-year-old progressive prevented reporters from attending a campaign event in Corona on Sunday, even though it was open to the rest of the public. The campaign reportedly barred reporters from a prior event as well.

Ocasio-Cortez returned to her district after stumping for like-minded candidates across the country, even joining up with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. She became an overnight political sensation and a sought-after endorsement on the left upon defeating longtime Rep. Joe Crowley in New York’s Democratic primary in June.

Her campaign did not immediately return a request for comment about the ban from Fox News. But a spokesman told the Queens Chronicle all the national attention contributed to the decision to prevent reporters from covering the event.

“We wanted to help create a space where community members felt comfortable and open to express themselves without the distraction of cameras and press. These were the first set of events where the press has been excluded,” campaign spokesman Corbin Trent said. “This is an outlier and will not be the norm. We’re still adjusting our logistics to fit Alexandria’s national profile.”

The explanation, though, did not satisfy reporters.

Seung Min Kim, a Washington Post reporter, tweeted that Ocasio-Cortez “is in for a rough time on Capitol Hill — where reporters roam freely at all hours of the day and night — if this is her attitude toward the press.”

She said the journalist ban “was designed to protect + invite vulnerable populations to PUBLIC discourse: immigrants, victims of domestic abuse, and so on.”

“We indicated previously that the event would be closed to press,” she said. “Future ones are open.”

Additionally, with this town hall non-story: it was designed to protect + invite vulnerable populations to PUBLIC discourse: immigrants, victims of domestic abuse, and so on.

We indicated previously that the event would be closed to press. Future ones are open.

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Ocasio2018) August 17, 2018

The candidate has faced some scrutiny from media fact-checkers for a spree of claims she’s made on the interview circuit.

Ocasio-Cortez’s banning of reporters came the same week more than 300 publications across the country — many of which supported Hillary Clinton in 2016 — ran coordinated editorials hitting back at President Trump’s attacks on members of the press.

TRUMP ACCUSES BOSTON GLOBE OF ‘COLLUSION’

The Boston Globe’s piece, published Thursday, titled “JOURNALISTS ARE NOT THE ENEMY,” said replacing “a free media with a state-run media” is the “first order of business for any corrupt regime taking over a country.”

“Today in the United States we have a president who has created a mantra that members of the media who do not blatantly support the policies of the current U.S. administration are the ‘enemy of the people,’” the editorial board wrote. “This is one of the many lies that have been thrown out by this president much like an old-time charlatan threw out ‘magic’ dust or water on a hopeful crowd.”

The Boston Globe, which was sold to the the Failing New York Times for 1.3 BILLION DOLLARS (plus 800 million dollars in losses investment), or 2.1 BILLION DOLLARS, was then sold by the Times for 1 DOLLAR. Now the Globe is in COLLUSION with other papers on free press. PROVE IT!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 16, 2018

President Trump responded by accusing the Globe of “collusion.”

“The Boston Globe, which was sold to the the Failing New York Times for 1.3 BILLION DOLLARS (plus 800 million dollars in losses investment), or 2.1 BILLION DOLLARS, was then sold by the Times for 1 DOLLAR. Now the Globe is in COLLUSION with other papers on free press. PROVE IT!” Trump tweeted.

Fox News’ Brooke Singman contributed to this report.

Alex Pappas is a politics reporter at FoxNews.com. Follow him on Twitter at @AlexPappas.

‘Little Red’ Ford Shelby Mustang found after fifty years

A legendary Ford Mustang that many thought was destroyed 50 years ago has been discovered rotting away in a Texas field. And it could be worth millions.

Seek and ye shall find. Eventually.

A legendary Ford Mustang that many thought was destroyed 50 years ago has been discovered rotting away in a Texas field. And it could be worth millions.

Affectionately called Little Red, the 1967 model was an experimental car that Ford loaned to Carrol Shelby to use as a test bed for the development of performance parts. Little Red and a later car, unofficially known as the Green Hornet, were the only two Shelby GT 500 notchback coupes of their era, each sporting a snazzy vinyl roof.

Shelby’s crew tinkered with the cars, trying out different body parts, engines and transmissions. Little Red was primarily configured with a supercharged 428 V8 and 3-speed automatic transmission, while the Green Hornet was fitted with a prototype independent rear suspension that never made it into production, but remains on the car today.

Bidding for the Green Hornet reached $1.9 million at a 2013 auction.

(Barrett-Jackson)

Little Red made an appearance at a Ford preview event in Los Angeles, where it inspired the creation of the first California Special Mustang, which aped its styling, if not performance. Shelby eventually sent the cars back to Ford for a date with the crusher, as was standard practice for prototype cars, but they both stood it up.

Little Red appeared at several promotional events.

(Martin L. Schorr)

The Green Hornet showed up at a Ford employee auction in 1971 and was resold several times until it ended up in the garage of Barrett-Jackson Auction House CEO, Craig Jackson, about 15 years ago. Little Red just disappeared.

A half-century of failed attempts to find it seemed to back up the prevailing view that it had been crushed. But like any good mystery, all that was missing was the right key to unlock it. Then Jackson got his hands on it.

Jackson and classic car specialist Jason Billups were doing research on the Green Hornet recently and found an inventory sheet from Ford listing its VIN along with those of some other cars. It dawned on Billups that everyone who’d been looking through records for Little Red were using its Shelby-issued serial number, rather than the original Ford VIN, which they now had.

(Kevin Marti)

And just like that, they found it. It was registered in Texas, where they connected with its current owner this past February — and the rest of its story unfolded.

Jackson told Fox News that Little Red, naturally-aspirated again, was sent to Courtesy Ford in Littleton, Colo., where a wounded Vietnam vet decided to treat himself, not knowing the car he was about to buy was any more special than the other Shelbys on the lot. After driving it for a couple of years he then sold to a man who lived in Wyoming at the time.

(Craig Jackson)

The second owner later moved to Texas and had it put away in a storage container that got broken into, the thief taking a few parts from the car, which was no longer in running condition.

After that, he brought it to his cousin’s house in Weatherford, Texas, and left it in his yard among a bunch of other old cars, where it was sitting when Jackson and his team arrived.

(Craig Jackson)

Along with Billups, he’d brought along renowned Mustang expert Kevin Marti to authenticate the find. Marti last year confirmed that a Mustang shell that had been sitting in a Mexican junkyard for years was one of the stunt cars used in the Steve McQueen film “Bullitt.”

This one wasn’t in much better shape. The engine and transmission are out, the front fenders and hood are missing, and you’d never give it a second look if not for the Shelby badge on the roof pillar.

The owner told Jackson he had a hunch that it might be Little Red about 25 years ago, but when he reached out to the folks at Shelby, they gave him the crusher story. Confident that it was the real deal, Jackson said the owner sold it to him for a fair price and was glad to be a part of what’s to come.

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Jackson wants to bring it back to life in as close to its ideal condition as possible. Of course, he’s not really really sure what that is, since it morphed many times while Ford and Shelby were working with it. So he’s launching a website to document the work and crowdsource information from anyone who has any.

“If your dad worked for Ford or Shelby, talk to them. Or look in your closet and see if you have any old pictures of it. Anything might help,” he said.

One hint he already has is the presence of two fuel pumps, which supports a rumor that it was twin-supercharged at one time.

As for the rest, the work will likely be a yearslong project that Marti thinks will rewrite Mustang history.

Jackson didn’t say what he planned to do with it when its done, but he did put Green Hornet up for auction in 2013 and the bidding got as high as $1.9 million, which wasn’t enough to meet its reserve.

White House officials are reportedly planning on holding onto more prepared security clearance revocations, and selectively releasing them as a distraction to negative news cycles, as needed.

In a newly released memoir, former Trump aide Omarosa Manigault Newman made some startling allegations about her White House tenure, including alleging that she heard Trump say the N-word in an audio recording.

One day later, the White House announced it revoked former CIA director John Brennan’s security clearance.

As President Donald Trump expressed interest in revoking “most, if not all” of the security clearances for a select group of current and former government officials, White House communication officials are believed to be planning on releasing them selectively, as a distraction to negative news cycles, The Washington Post reported on Friday.

White House staffers, including press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and deputy chief of staff Bill Shine, reportedly discussed timing the revocations so that it would divert attention away from unflattering stories about Trump and his administration, one senior White House official told The Post.

This week, the White House faced a string of embarrassing news reports stemming from the release of former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman’s tell-all book, “Unhinged: An Insider’s Account of the Trump White House.”

Omarosa, who was abruptly fired in December, recorded several phone calls with Trump and other White House officials, and detailed them in her memoir. In addition to saving a “treasure trove” of media files, Omarosa made other bombshell claims about her rocky tenure, including a claim that she heard Trump say the N-word in an audio recording.

In the days leading up to the release of Omarosa’s book, the White House dealt with a steady stream of embarrassing audio leaks and claims made by the former staffer. Despite his staff’s advice on not to address her claims, Trump denied the allegations and blasted Omarosa by calling her “that dog” and “Wacky and Deranged.”

But on Wednesday, one day after the book’s release, the White House announced that it revoked former CIA director John Brennan’s security clearance.

Brennan is believed to have stood out to Trump after appearing on TV and becoming, in Trump’s view, too “political,” aides told The Post. The former CIA director has been especially critical of Trump during his presidency and accused him of “political corruption,” along with other unflattering charges on Twitter.

In addition to Trump’s fiery tweets against Brennan, the White House accused him of “erratic conduct and behavior” in explaining its decision.

“Mr. Brennan’s lying and recent conduct, characterized by increasingly frenzied commentary, is wholly inconsistent with access to the nation’s most closely held secrets and facilitates the very aim of our adversaries, which is to sow division and chaos,” the White House said.

Brennan adamantly denied that characterization and made rebuttals on Twitter and The New York Times.

In additional to revoking Brennan’s security clearance, Trump signaled he wanted yank more security clearances from current and former officials he believes either criticized him or were involved in the Russia investigation, according to The Post.

The timing of Brennan’s security clearance revocation was not a coincidence, a senior White House official reportedly said. While a statement for Brennan’s revocation was composed in July, three weeks prior to the official announcement, the White House decided to finally pull the trigger on Wednesday in order to derail the media coverage surrounding Omarosa’s book.

To an extent, the move was successful. The decision sparked outrage and once again brought widespread condemnation and rebuke to Trump’s doorstep. Fellow veterans and political luminaries hailed Brennan as a patriot, forcing Omarosa to share the spotlight and airtime on TV.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday night.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is increasingly venting frustration to his national security team about the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan and showing renewed interest in a proposal by Blackwater founder Erik Prince to privatize the war, current and former senior administration officials said.

Prince’s idea, which first surfaced last year during the president’s Afghanistan strategy review, envisions replacing troops with private military contractors who would work for a special U.S. envoy for the war who would report directly to the president.

It has raised ethical and security concerns among senior military officials, key lawmakers and members of Trump’s national security team. A year after Trump’s strategy announcement, his advisers are worried his impatience with the Afghanistan conflict will cause him to seriously consider proposals like Prince’s or abruptly order a complete U.S. withdrawal, officials said.

In an interview with NBC News, Prince said he believes Trump advisers who oppose his plan are painting “as rosy a picture as they can” of the situation on the ground, including that “peace is around the corner” with recent U.S. efforts for peace talks with the Taliban. He said he believes Trump’s advisers “over-emphasize the fluff and flare of these so-called peace talks.”

Prince, a staunch Trump supporter whose sister is Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, argues that after 17 years of war in Afghanistan, it’s time for the U.S. to try something new.

“I know he’s frustrated,” Prince said of the president. “He gave the Pentagon what they wanted. …And they haven’t delivered.”

Prince said he hasn’t spoken directly to Trump about the plan, but told NBC News he plans to launch an aggressive media “air campaign” in coming days to try to get the president to embrace it.

His effort coincides with Tuesday’s one-year anniversary of Trump announcing a strategy that increased the U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan. Trump approved the Pentagon recommendations reluctantly.

“The strategy as announced a year ago was essentially just a dressed-up version of the status quo,” said Jarrett Blanc, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who served as a special representative on Afghanistan and Pakistan at the State Department during the Obama administration.

A spokesperson for the National Security Council said Trump is committed to the current strategy he signed off on after months of deliberations.

President Donald Trump receives a briefing on a military strike on Syria from his National Security team, including a video teleconference with Secretary of Defense Gen. James Mattis, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph F. Dunford, on April 6, 2017.Shealah Craighead / The White House via Getty Images file

“No such proposal from Erik Prince is under consideration,” the spokesperson said. “The president, like most Americans, would like to see more progress in Afghanistan. However, he also recognizes that withdrawing precipitously from Afghanistan would lead to the re-emergence of terrorist safe havens, putting American national security and lives in danger.”

In recent briefings with Trump, the president’s advisers have emphasized the possibility of a political resolution with the Taliban and downplay the lack of military advances, officials said.

“The president hears about Afghan military and political progress and the possibility of reconciliation during his briefings, but he rarely gets the full picture of security on the ground,” said one senior U.S. official who has seen the briefing materials.

The NSC spokesperson said, however, that the president is briefed regularly on Afghanistan, and “his briefs are comprehensive, covering both positive improvements and problematic actions.”

A defense official said the current U.S. strategy in Afghanistan might not show significant results until at least next summer, complicating efforts to convince the president to stick with it.

“The current effort will show results, but it could be another year or more before the new advising mission makes a real, widespread difference on the ground,” the official said.

Trump’s renewed interest in privatization was stoked by a recent video shot by Prince, according to a senior administration official, in which Prince argues that deploying private contractors instead of U.S. troops, and using limited government resources, would save the U.S. money.

The White House currently has no plans for a comprehensive Afghanistan policy review, officials said. While one could take place after a new U.S. military commander of the war takes over in coming weeks, some officials said the president’s team has been reluctant to conduct one now out of concern about what the president will decide.

Prince said he hopes to speak in coming days with some officials on the National Security Council about his proposal. He said that while last year he discussed it with Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo when Pompeo was CIA director, he has not spoken to John Bolton, who become Trump’s third national security adviser in April.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at the Presidential Palace in Kabul, Afghanistan, on July 9, 2018.Andrew Harnik / Reuters file

The defense official said Prince’s idea hasn’t made its way to the Pentagon for official consideration yet, but it could quickly become a real option if Trump pushes for it.

Mattis and Pompeo both oppose Prince’s plan, officials said. A senior State Department official said there’s “not a chance” it will be adopted.

Asked for Bolton’s view of Prince’s idea, the NSC spokesperson declined to comment.

In an interview with NBC’s Andrea Mitchell Friday on MSNBC, Prince said his plan was not privatization, “not a private army. It is a very clear delineation of who’s in charge, okay? The Afghan government working for a U.S. government official, funded by the United States at a fraction of a fraction of the cost of what we’re spending now.” Prince said his plan would save the U.S. more than $50 billion.

“The president was right to campaign against endless wars,” said Prince. “If we leave decisions on war solely to the Pentagon, we will be at war forever.”

‘I like following my instincts’

The security situation in Afghanistan has worsened in the year since Trump signed off on the current strategy, and there are increased concerns about government stability and corruption in Kabul. The Taliban continues to make gains, while the U.S. has renewed efforts for peace talks with the militant group.

As NBC News reported in August 2017, before approving the plan the president complained to his advisers that the U.S. was losing the war and suggested firing Gen. John Nicholson, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan.

When Trump announced the current strategy, he noted that his “original instinct was to pull out, and historically I like following my instincts.” But he said he’d decided to listen to his advisers to pursue an “honorable and enduring outcome” to the war. The U.S. currently has about 15,000 troops in Afghanistan.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Wednesday that the president is “committed to finding a political solution to end the conflict in Afghanistan.”

“As always, we’re going to continue to review and look at the best ways to move forward,” Sanders said.

Lately Trump has pressed his advisers about Afghanistan progress on a weekly basis in Cabinet meetings and national security briefings, officials said. As he’s grown frustrated, Trump has leaned on Pompeo, the member of his national security team who is closest to him. Pompeo traveled to Afghanistan last month for a trip the administration said was designed to advance the current U.S. strategy.

Prince was not an official adviser to the Trump campaign but donated $250,000 to pro-Trump causes during the campaign and met with members of Trump’s national security team during the transition. The Washington Post reported that special counsel Robert Mueller is looking into whether Prince tried to establish a backchannel between Russia and the Trump administration during a meeting with a Putin associate in the Seychelles in 2017.

In his interview with Mitchell, Prince denied his meeting with the Russian was about a backchannel. “It was an incidental meeting and I had no follow up with him since then.”

When Prince’s plan had Trump’s attention in 2017, it had the backing of his former strategist Steve Bannon and the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner.

The plan appealed to Trump because of the promise that it would be less expensive and put fewer American troops at risk than the current U.S. strategy.

It calls for private contractors and aircraft to aid Afghan forces, with some help from the CIA and the Pentagon’s special operations forces — all of whom would be overseen by a U.S. government envoy for Afghanistan policy who reports directly to the president and is given the authority to coordinate with the Afghan government.

Prince believes Trump’s frustration now could provide a path for the privatization idea. Trump also has shown more of a willingness follow his instincts on foreign policy since reshuffling his national security team earlier this year to replace former National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster and former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson — both of whom opposed Prince’s plan.

U.S. service members walk off a helicopter on the runway at Camp Bost on Sept. 11, 2017 in Helmand Province, Afghanistan.Andrew Renneisen / Getty Images file

A former senior administration official said while the U.S. has relied on foreign governments to help pay for military conflicts, it would be new to ask those countries to pay private security companies directly.

Prince’s close ties to the United Arab Emirates, as well as the record of Blackwater, most notably in Iraq, would likely raise strong objections among administration officials and members of Congress. In 2007, Blackwater security contractors escorting a U.S. embassy convoy killed 17 civilians in Baghdad’s Nisour Square. One employee was convicted of first-degree murder and three were convicted of manslaughter, but their verdicts were overturned in 2017.

The use of private security contractors in U.S. military conflicts has been controversial, including in Afghanistan. Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai curtailed the use of security contractors, a policy the current government would have to undo for a plan like the one proposed by Prince to be implemented.

“It’s a ridiculous idea. It would only make things worse, prolong the war, and cause more deaths,” the former senior administration official said.

Brian Katulis, a senior fellow at the left-leaning Center for American Progress, said privatization would make it harder for Congress and others to know what precisely is happening in the war.

“It makes an already murky position murkier,” Katulis said. “The cost savings is not worth the potential damage to oversight of U.S. national security.”